Sling TV brings cloud DVR recording to Apple TV
Dish's internet-only TV service, Sling TV, has announced the availability of Cloud DVR support for the Apple TV, letting users record some (but not all) shows for later viewing.
The option is currently in a rough "first look" state and costs $5 per month, Sling said on Monday. Previously, the technology only worked with Roku and Android devices, including Amazon streamers.
With the feature active, subscribers can theoretically keep recordings as long as they want. Sling noted, however, that after the 50-hour mark, it will automatically make room for new recordings by deleting the oldest data. DVR functions are also blocked on some channels, presumably because of rights agreements.
Apple TV owners must go to Sling.com to pay for the DVR package. The company didn't say when the option might expand to other platforms, like iOS, except to promise broader device support in the future.
DVR functions are quickly becoming a dividing point among internet TV providers. While they're available on Sling, YouTube TV, and PlayStation Vue, all of those services have different implementations, and the option is still missing entirely from DirecTV Now.
Hulu may launch its own live TV platform as soon as next month, but like Sling ask subscribers to pay extra for full DVR support.
The option is currently in a rough "first look" state and costs $5 per month, Sling said on Monday. Previously, the technology only worked with Roku and Android devices, including Amazon streamers.
With the feature active, subscribers can theoretically keep recordings as long as they want. Sling noted, however, that after the 50-hour mark, it will automatically make room for new recordings by deleting the oldest data. DVR functions are also blocked on some channels, presumably because of rights agreements.
Apple TV owners must go to Sling.com to pay for the DVR package. The company didn't say when the option might expand to other platforms, like iOS, except to promise broader device support in the future.
DVR functions are quickly becoming a dividing point among internet TV providers. While they're available on Sling, YouTube TV, and PlayStation Vue, all of those services have different implementations, and the option is still missing entirely from DirecTV Now.
Hulu may launch its own live TV platform as soon as next month, but like Sling ask subscribers to pay extra for full DVR support.
Comments
but why? If they are recording to the cloud, presumably they aren't actually duplicating recordings. If a show has already been recorded to the cloud by anyone, and you have the service, why can't you just set it to "record all available" and have access to anything anyone recorded (that you have a subscription to). Then, for example, when you find out the next day your favorite actor, band, whatever, was on one of the late shows, you can still watch it. You don't have to record (and later delete) all of the shows just for that random one. Or when you discover a show midseason, you can watch all of the earlier episodes because they were already recorded into the cloud you already subscribed to.
PS Vue has the ESPNs, Fox Sports channels and NBCSN for 29.99 for me. With Sling you have to choose between ESPN and FS/NBC or pay $40, and then +5 for DVR. And then only 1 stream for the ESPNs.
Did I miss something?
edit: Didn't see Sog's reply - lots of crossover.
I'm not beholden to Vue (I have issues with some of its technical restrictions) so I'll bounce around for the best deal that meets my needs. PS - I don't want/need HBO.
Edit: um - $35 Directv gets you 60 channels, $60 gets you 100. And I get the same broadcast one (I checked local availability) that I get with Vue.
http://cdn.directv.com/content/dam/dtv/gmott/html/compare-packages-account.html
Why the attempt at disinformation?
Part of the reason I stayed with the service I have is the fact we mostly watch time shifted content. I have DTV, and they have; Real time shows, with the ability to rewind an already in progress show so you can watch from the beginning, on-demand and also if you miss a show you can watch it at any time up to two weeks after it first air. Even with those options I find the shows we tend to time shift are either not available on-demand or I realize too late I miss a recent show and I am past the 2 week window. This has kind of forces us to stay with the DVR. we let it record as much as we like and we do not have to worry about doing a search to find a show, since searching sucks on these system. The other issue is on demand will not let you fast forward
I have 4TB DVR drive so I can record 100's of hours shows, 50 hours is not really a whole lot of space they are giving their users for $5/moth, probably around 160G to 250G. depending on the content and the compression they are using.
In this day and age, we should have everything on-demand, but content owners really do not like this model. Hell, for Network DVR there is no reason to have more than one copy of content, you can have one copy and a database that shows who either requested to record or has access to the show and everyone can access that one copy. But again content owner require an actual copy for every person who actually press the record button. This alone shows you content owners are still living in the VCR days or physical recording.
Long and short content owners control most everything and they want everyone to pay over and over every time the content is viewed.